Political Changes A. Alexander The Great

II.
CLASSICAL CIVILIZATION (PAGE 104)

1. POLITICAL CHANGES
a. Alexander the great
One of the almost uninterrupted warfare.
334 B.C = started invasion of Persia, a self-styled avenger of the injuries
done to the Hellenes by the Persian Kings.
Great battles
a. Granicus 334 B. C
b. Issus 333 B.C
c. Gaugamela 331 B.C
330 B.C until his death 323 B.C he tried to secure his empire by melding
Asiatic and Hellenic peoples and civilizations
Recruited Persians and other Oriental peoples into his arm, trained them
in the Macedonian fashion
Married an Oriental Princess Roxane
Persuaded many of his officers and 7,000 of His Macedonian soldiers to
imitate his example.
Alexander rejected the traditional Greek view of inferiority of barbarian
people, and some scholars believe that eh advance the theory that all
men are essentially similar, no matter what their race or culture might be.
For 3 years he fought a series of difficult campaigns in central Asia,
penetrating as far as eastward as the Oxus and Jaxartes rivers then to
southward invading the Indus valley
325 B.C back to Mesopotamia
Naval exploring party traveled from the mouth of Indus River through the
Indian Ocean and into the Persian Gulf, while Alexander with the main
force passed overland through the desert of Gedrosia where they suffered
great hardship.
Upon return, his empire is in serious disorder: satraps abused their
powers.
He set strenuous reform.
323 B.C just as the army was ready to set out (probably to attack Arabia),
Alexander caught a fever and died at Babylon being only 33 yrs. old.
His policy of blending oriental and Hellenic people met with opposition
during his own lifetime, and after his death the policy was abandoned.
Some of the numerous Greek cities which Alexander had founded at
strategic points in the empire continued to flourish and provided focal
points for the disseminations of Greek institutions among at least the
upper classes of Near Eastern cities.
Marriage between Asiatics and Greeks and Macedonians become common,
since few women emigrated from Greece either in Alexanders lifetime or
later.
b. The Successor States

Alexander left no heir at his death but Roxane bore him a posthumous
son, but there was one in the immediate royal family is capable to control
over the Macedonian generals
Central power of the empire quickly become ineffective
The various generals who had been appointed as satraps in one or
another part of the empire, acting without much regard to the central
government
They strove to build up their power, fought one another and divide and
redivided the empire between themselves.
Alexanders son was murdered in 310 B.C
Efforts to reestablish the unity until 301 B.C when the last such effort
failed.
Stable pattern of states emerged twenty years later by 218. B.C
3 great monarchies
1. Ptolemaic
- Center in Egypt
2. Seleucid
- Centers in Mesopotamia and Syria
3. Macedon
- Ruled by the Antigonid dynasty
Greek kings continued to rule in central Asia and in India for more than a
century
Asia Minor came to be divided: King of Pergamum (northwest) became
the most prominent; Greece itself won a precarious and intermittent
independence.
Greece for the strength and security of Hellenistic monarchies of the east
depended in considerable measure on a constant supply of Greek
mercenaries and administrators
Macedon and Egypt engaged in repeated struggles for influence in
Greece.
Egypt and Seleucid empire engaged in a similarly prolonged struggle for
securing of Palestine and southern Syria
The Greek cities were in a difficult position at best.
Maintained a shadow of independence by securing favorable terms of
alliance with one or another of the great monarchies.
The Achaean league in the northern Peloponnese and the Aetolian league
in northwestern Greece became the leading powers of Greece proper.
Have right to levy taxes and to raise armies from member cities and the
representative principle was used in forming the federal deliberative
bodies.
2
The freedom of the Greeks (i.e., the sovereignty of each city) became a
political watchword for any foreign power which sought to gain support
among the Greek states; but such freedom never proved practical.
Liberators regularly turned into oppressors of Greek freedom
Constant warfare and the potential or active hostility of the Oriental
subject peoples soon weakened the Hellenistic states
The chronic disunity of Greece helped the Romans against Macedon; and
the internal weakness of the oriental states made them relatively easy
conquests.
Roman power was gradual and decisive annexations were not made until
145 B.C
30 BC was the last area of the Hellenistic east, Egypt added to the Roman
empire
Roman diplomacy and arms had been all powerful for more than a
hundred years before that time.
2. ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
a. Population
A large current of emigration to their relatively rich lands set in
Thousands and perhaps hundreds of thousands of Greeks left their
homeland to settle in the New Greek cities which Alexander and his
successors established to the number of more than two hundred.
Emigration to the orient probably reduces the total population of the old
centers of Greek life
The second century B.C some land which had formerly been cultivated
was turned over to pasture and literary references to abandonees villages
begin to multiply
Number of slaves increased
In Macedon, however, the peasantry remained numerous until after the
Roman conquest
Egypt the administrative and engineering skill of the Greeks extended the
area of irrigation and improved the technique of farming
Population rose to match the increased carrying capacity of the land
although direct information is lacking.
b. Technological Progress
Greek and oriental traditions led to a number of notable improvements in
technology
Learned how to attack walled towns
Siege engines and catapults were invented
Elephants were introduced as animals of war
Ships increase size
Harbor improvements such as moles and lighthouses
Construction of aqueducts and sewers
3
Public assembly halls

Mechanical inventions such as the surveying level, pulleys and cranes for
lifting heavy loads
Archimedes reduces the principles of leverage to mathematical precision.
Use of money
Systems of public education and endowed private schools were
established.
Book publication became a regular business, carried on by means of slave
copyists. Writing was done on parchment or papyrus rolls
Great libraries
Common language, a simplified form of the Attic dialect, over the whole
Near East facilitate both trade and intellectual relations; but for the most
part, works of literature were composed only in the (increasingly archaic)
Attic dialect of the fifth and fourth centuries
c. Economic Organization
State control over production and distribution which was instituted in the
Ptolemaic and to a lesser extent, in the Seleucid Empire.
Egypt the administrative bureaucracy planned production; prices for many
products were fixed by the government and for some of the more variable
commodities, the government enforced a monopoly
Ptolemies the riches rulers of their time.
Egypt became the principal granary for the Greek cities, and shipped gain
as far west as Rome
Seleucid empire, centralization of economic control never approached
Ptolemaic rigor
A conglomeration of privileged Greek cities, temple estates, royal
domains, even tribal districts, pursued the divergent types of economic
and political life to which long precedent had attached them.
Monarchy took an active part in trade
Royal income was kind
Government converted into money by sale or export
Macedon and Greece remained for less wealthy then the Oriental States.
Their strength lay mainly in manpower
Greece, only Corinth continued to be an active center of trade and
industry
Rhodes built up an important trade, serving as entrepot between Greece
and the Orient
Delos replaced Rhodes as the economic center of the Aegan
d. Growth of Trade
Alexanders conquests established direct commercial relation between
India and the Hellenistic world, trade with China
4
Export of olive oil, wine and manufactured goods, in exchange for what
and raw materials was duplicated in the Hellenistic cities to some extent
but many of them were situated in rich grain-producing areas and so did
not need to depend on long-distance transport for their food supply.
Exchange of manufactured goods
Corinth became famous for its bronze work, Alexandria for its papyrus,
glass, lien and perfumes; and Antioch for its textiles
The Hellenistic age probably witnessed the highest development of
regional economic interdependence and specialization ever achieved in
the ancient world.
Hellenistic civilization was introduced into Western Europe.
Mediterranean world and these areas were probably less important than it
had been in Seleucid times.
3. SOCIAL STRUCTURE
4. Cultural Development
a. Religion
b. Art
c. Literature
d. Science
1) Astronomy
2) Mathematics
3) Physics and Engineering
4) Geography
5) Medicine and Biology
6) Literary and Linguistic scholarship
e. Philosophy

Political Changes A. Alexander The Great

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Political Changes A. Alexander The Great

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Political Changes A. Alexander The Great

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

II.

CLASSICAL CIVILIZATION (PAGE 104)

b. The Successor States

Public assembly halls

You might also like